Early Evening of March 16, 2010

This red maple (Acer rubrum) in Charter Oak Court (backlit here by the setting sun) is now in riotous bloom.

Compare this post to see what this branch looked like a week and a half ago.

The stamens are now very prominent.

What a profusion of flowers!

Bravo, Mother Nature!

Morning of March 7, 2010 (continued)

Buds ready to burst forth on a deciduous magnolia on the north side of the W&OD bike path east of Old Reston Avenue.  This is probably either a Japanese magnolia (Magnolia liliiflora) or its hybrid, the saucer magnolia (Magnolia x soulangeana), for which see this Virginia Tech fact sheet.

On the north side of the W&OD bike path, midway between American Dream Way and Isaac Newton Square, one can find a number of these tall bushes that are now bearing a profusion of catkins.  I don't know what this might be, though it quite well could be a member of the birch family, perhaps eastern hophornbeam.

Dried fruit husks on a sumac (Rhus spp.) on the south side of the W&OD bike path west of Isaac Newton Square.  For a view of sumacs in fruit last fall, see this post.

Dogbane (Apocynum spp.), with its characteristic tuning-fork-like seed pods, in the clump on the south side of the W&OD bike path just east of Wiehle Avenue that was also featured in this post.  Most of the seed pods are still closed and dried up;  only a few have opened (note the much lighter-colored leaf-like structures in the upper center of the image;  these are seed pods that have split open).

Morning of March 7, 2010

After a long winter, Nature in Reston is finally reawakening.

A red maple (Acer rubrum) with buds ready to flower, highlighted against an evergreen holly (Ilex spp.).  This maple is located in Charter Oak Court.

Close-up of some of the buds.

Ghostly remnants of the structures holding the samaras, or fruit, of a tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) in Charter Oak Court.  For what this structure looked like last fall, see this post.

Fresh buds and old dried-out fruit on an American sycamore (Platanus occidentalis) on the east side of Old Reston Ave. just north of its intersection with American Dream Way.  For a view from last fall, see this post.

New buds can also be seen on this winged burningbush (Euonymus alatus) on the northern side of the W&OD bike path just east of its intersection with Old Reston Avenue (also featured in this post).  With the leaves gone, one can also clearly see the protruding stripes of cork that give this species its name "winged".

Dried husks that once held fruit persisting on a crape myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica) on the north side of the W&OD bike path east of Old Reston Ave.  For what these structures looked like last fall, when they still contained fruit, see this post.